A Dutch porn website must remove any amateur porn that it hosts without the explicit permission of the people in it, a court in Amsterdam has said in a landmark decision which could affect all such platforms. Apart from material made by professionals,
contains thousands of videos made surreptitiously, for instance in changing rooms, and so-called revenge porn where videos of sexual acts are uploaded by a spiteful partner.
The case was brought two years ago by foundation Stop Online Shaming (SOS) and HelpWanted, which is part of an organisation combating child abuse. ‘Until now it was up to each individual victim to prove that he or she had not given permission for the material to be shown,’ SOS spokesman Willem van Lynden told Trouw. ‘The judge had turned this around. All material is now illegal which is not a professional production unless it can be shown permission to show it was given.’
The court’s decision could have far-reaching consequences for other platforms showing exploitative pornographic material, Van Lynden said, and will serve as a precedent to start legal proceedings against other sites, including international ones. Pornhub, the world’s largest porn site, removed a large part of its content last year following accusations of videos showing sex with children and rape. ‘If they have, all well and good, but we will go after the others that haven’t,’ Van Lynden said.
Vagina.nl, which is owned by Evolve Media and contains tens of thousands of videos, says some 80 to 150 videos are uploaded every day, most of which do not make it through the screening process. Its disclaimer says the owners of the videos are wholly responsible for asking permission from the people who appear in them. However, the judge has now refuted this and ordered the site to remove the videos, or pay up to €30,000 in compensation.
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